PHILADELPHIA — His name will be forever connected to all the greats in Philadelphia Eagles history, regardless of what happens from this point on. That's what has LeSean McCoy smiling brightest these days.

Where he stands now and where he projects to finish is secondary.

For the record, though, the sixth-year running back needs just 48 yards in today's NFC home clash with the Seattle Seahawks (4:25 p.m., FOX) to become this storied franchise's all-time leading rusher. He already owns 10 franchise records.

McCoy (6,491 rushing yards) is set to break the record of 6,538 established by Wilbert Montgomery in the early 1980s. Earlier this season, he passed Steve Van Buren (5,860) as well as the man who passed him the baton, Brian Westbrook (5,995).

Westbrook's last season with the Eagles (2009) was McCoy's first, and the elder statesman shapes McCoy's play to this day, along with running backs coach Duce Staley, who ranks fifth on the all-time list.

"Just from the jump, when I got here, to even now, when I'm frustrated with different things, I call [Westbrook] and ask him what he thinks," McCoy said. "He's tough on me. He tells me things I don't want to hear.

"But nobody's worse than Duce. We have that big brother, little brother role. Tons of credit goes out to Duce. Since I came in here, he's helped me to reach a certain level in my game that I thought I didn't have."

McCoy, contrary to some of his famous Twitter battles, also is a fan of some of his contemporaries, such as Seattle's strong but silent running back, Marshawn Lynch. Lynch (212 carries, 956 yards) and McCoy (242 carries, 1,018 yards) are two of the league's premier backs.

"I'm a fan of Beast Mode," McCoy said of Lynch's gridiron pseudoynm. "He runs hard, aggressive. … I remember we played them out there a couple years ago. He was carrying the whole team. I pay attention to him."

In that game, a 31-14 Seahawks win in November of 2011, Lynch ran for 148 yards and two touchdowns to drop the Eagles to 4-8.

A lot has changed since then, particularly for Shady, which is McCoy's gridiron pseudonym.

He's coming off a season in which he won the NFL rushing title and flourished like never before in coach Chip Kelly's run-oriented offense. And despite a sluggish first half of the season this year, McCoy still has piled up very good numbers and is No. 3 in the league behind Dallas' DeMarco Murray (1,606) and Pittsburgh's Le'Veon Bell (1,046).

But he will need to have some much bigger games in the final quarter of the season to match last season's output. McCoy is on pace to finish with a respectble 1,357 yards this season, but it's his lowest yards-per-carry average (4.2) since he became a full-time starter in 2010

However, last week's 25 carries, 159 rushing yards and 6.4 yards-per-attempt average in a 33-10 demolition of the Dallas Cowboys were all season highs for McCoy, who has 23 100-yard rushing games in his career.

Unlike Lynch, who refuses to talk to the media, McCoy's mouth has been known to open as wide as some of the holes he runs through, and although his foot occasionally winds up in it, he has journeyed to this point with a healthy respect of the Eagles greats whose records he is shattering on a regular basis.

"It's something cool [to be able to break the all-time rushing record]," McCoy said. "I didn't imagine when I got drafted here that I would potentially have a chance to hold the rushing record as an Eagle. So that's something big, that's something I'm looking forward to.

"… I got word that [Montgomery is] actually happy [that his record is about to be broken], from him just liking me as a person, as a player. When I met him, I was very respectful. And he's done a lot. I remember he was working with [former Baltimore Ravens RB] Ray Rice [as the former Ravens RB coach], and I would always talk to Ray about him. He's a heck of a coach and he was a great player."

McCoy hopes the next great Eagles back pushes him to No. 2.

"You always want the next guy that comes up to do well," he said. "And that's what this game is all about, for records to be broken, to pass it down.

"I remember when I broke some of Tony Dorsett's records [at the University of Pittsburgh], just how happy he was, and the guy was a hall-of-famer who's done everything that you can do in this league and in college."

McCoy will give Staley a shot or two about their ranking on the team's list every now and then, but it's all done in good fun.

"We always have fun and we always work hard and he's always trying to get me better. Even when I feel where I'm at certain point where I think I've arrived, he's always pushing me even more."

Obviously McCoy will go down as the most productive back in team history. But does he pass the eye test as the very best?

Fan engagement liason and former Eagles wide receiver Harold Carmichael, who played with Montgomery and has helped run every practice Westbrook and McCoy ever participated in, was asked that question.

"It's tough to rank them," Carmichael said. "I'm kind of partial to Wilbert. Westbrook, he was an awesome running back. And really, to me, when you look at Westbrook and Wilbert and LeSean, [LeSean] is in between [in style]. He did both of those. He's nifty [like Westbrook] and was almost like a power running back [like Montgomery] too.

"So you look at the numbers, LeSean is about to get that rushing record. So now you have to put him at No. 1. … The numbers are true."

McCoy wants to end this 54-year NFL championship drought most of all.

The further we go, the more it becomes apparent that it will be impossible for this nucleus to do it without him.